CHAPTER TOOLS

Keywords:

access devices;

smart cards;

Internet technology;

data networks;

mobility;

electronic cash standards;

markup languages;

objects;

middleware

Summary

In this chapter we've raced through some, but by no means all, of the technology that supports eBusiness. As is often the case, the last thing you know is what to put first, but here we started with a few of the burgeoning range of devices used to transact online business – from Set-Top Boxes to Kiosks. Given that people need to impress their individuality on all of these devices, we then moved on to explain the main article for achieving this, the smart card.

The next main part of the chapter looked at the various ways in which the user kit can be hooked up. We explained a little of how the Internet works, what the commercial data networks, can do and where mobile access fits in.

Finally, we move on from tangible artefacts to abstract ideas – markup languages, objects and middleware technology, and standards. All of these ideas appear in real life as the software that powers eBusiness applications and services.